Rookie
magazine was launched by the world's youngest style icon, Tavi Gevinson, on Monday. Gevinson exploded onto the fashion scene at the age of 12, after her blog
Style Rookie
, written from her home in Illinois, drew a cult following of the greatest names in fashion.

"I started thinking about the possibility of
Rookie
a year or so ago, it seemed like a good venue for pure aesthetic enjoyment and smart, fun writing," she explains in her editor's letter. "As my freshman year of high school progressed, I found myself needing something that could be more than that." The magazine seems to be a hybrid of
The New Yorker
,
The Paris Review
and
Nowness
, aimed at the discerning, ultra-hip tween crowd.

Gevinson began her precocious, but oddly pitch-perfect, fashion blog in 2008 and before long was being invited to the runway shows for Rodarte, Alexander Wang, Marc Jacobs and other "directional" designers. She then collaborated with the Mulleavy sisters (of Rodarte) on a fashion line for Target. And, wait for it - the height of having arrived - she was profiled in
The New Yorker
. Her quirky style -
Virgin Suicides
meets granny chic was snapped by the fashion photographers. US
Harper's Bazaar
asked her to interview Gwen Stefani. She then began talking to Jane Pratt (former editor of the now defunct magazines
Sassy
and
Jane
) about starting her own online magazine.

"We post three times a day: roughly when school ends, when dinner starts and when it's really late and you should be writing a paper but are Facebook stalking instead," Gevinson says of
Rookie
.

The Pratt/Gevinson partnership never fully materialised as Gevinson wanted to retain creative control, it was reported. She now describes Pratt on her website as her "fairy godmother".
New York
magazine is selling advertising space for
Rookie
a freelance basis.

Of her new venture, Gevinson told the
New York Times
in an interview:

"We're trying to avoid getting too '90s nostalgic." The interviewer describes Gevinson looking over some unusual reader requests for advice ("Why do I like boys who look like they're dying?"). "A lot of people who grew up with all that stuff hate reading, like, what a 15-year-old has to say about it."

Gevinson's story editor is Anaheed Alani, a former freelance sub editor for the
New York Times Magazine
. There is a team of 37 writers and editors - with backgrounds ranging from editorships at
Harper's Bazaar
, British
Vogue
,
Dazed & Confused
, the
Los Angeles Times
to writers for the television show
Saturday Night Live
and cable channel HBO.

"Our content respects a kind of intelligence in the readers that right now a lot of writing about teenage girls doesn't," Gevinson says. "People think it's just going to be another site or magazine that talks about how great celebrities are or how awful celebrities are or dieting... And I'm like, 'Just you wait and see. ' "

Like any proper fashionista, Gevinson has a "mood board" above her desk, where she sticks photographs, sketches and pages from books that inspire her creative process. And there amongst the stylish clutter is the famous image of the twins taken by Diane Arbus.